Run it up the flagpole

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score 16

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Taught by Lecturer Rapscallion | Edit | Permalink | Tagged as awareness, escalate, escalation, lunch break, run it up the flagpole, teamwork, | 3 Comments »

To make others, some of which that are higher up on the ladder than the current group, aware of a situation or issue.

As in...
Walter, the client just called and she seemed very PO'd that the whole accounting department was at lunch at the same time. When Phillip gets back I'm going to run it up the flagpole and see what we can do about resolving this going forward. I swear, I just can't take another bitchy call today. I'm going to freak out.

Actually, this definition sucks. Let me add my own. You can also share "run it up the flagpole" with a friend or share it on Twitter.

Comments 3

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Lecturer Chuck E. Cheese said:

This sounds like a Harvey Danger song. How this got into biz speak I have no fucking clue.
9/30/2008 9:59:43 PM » Reply

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TA Bridgman said:

This is a 60-year-old+ Madison Avenue phrase. It meant to give people outside of a given team a chance to review, shoot-down, react to a slogan or strategy. "Let's run it up the flagpole and see who salutes it" was a Jack Lemmon line in Twelve Angry Men (he was an ad man). Similarly a copywriter might say "Let's put it on the train and see if it gets off in Westport" referring to Westport, CT, where many agency executives lived (e.g. the lead character in Mad Men)
5/7/2009 1:31:34 PM » Reply

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TA Bridgman said:

This is a 60-year-old+ Madison Avenue phrase. It meant to give people outside of a given team a chance to review, shoot-down, react to a slogan or strategy. "Let's run it up the flagpole and see who salutes it" was a Jack Lemmon line in Twelve Angry Men (he was an ad man). Similarly a copywriter might say "Let's put it on the train and see if it gets off in Westport" referring to Westport, CT, where many agency executives lived (e.g. the lead character in Mad Men)
5/7/2009 1:38:38 PM » Reply