Wikipedia
Greasy pole, grease pole or greased pole refers to a pole that has been made slippery and thus difficult to grip. More specifically, it is the name of several events that involve staying on, climbing up, walking over or otherwise traversing such a pole. This kind of event exist in several variations around the world.
Usage examples of "greasy pole".
He wasn't sure who he could trust, or how even his closest friends would react to him now that he was suddenly the man at the top of the greasy pole.
Not at all the type you expected to see at the head of a hungry young firm still clawing its way up the greasy pole in a notoriously rough-and-ready business like mining.
People got to the top of the greasy pole largely because they wanted to, real badsometimes so they could do the job, more often not.
People got to the top of the greasy pole largely because they wanted to, real bad-sometimes so they could do the job, more often not.
There seemed to be a definite link between the spiderlike deviousness of Scaragoglu and the sort of low cunning Paddy had picked up in a decade sliding up and down the greasy pole of rank from rating to noncom and back.
No more than a deacon with a couple of lucrative benefices to support him-and his expensive sisters and profligate father, he reflected-as he scrambled at the greasy pole of Europe's power politics.
I let go, hit the branch squarely with my feet, teetered sickeningly and then dropped forward, wrapping my arms about it and doing a fair imitation of a man on a greasy pole.