FOR SALES TEAMS, OUTBOUND ROLES AND L&D LEADERS

Bomb Proof: Sales Resilience Under Pressure

Steadier under pressure, stronger on the call

A practical workshop for teams who face rejection daily, need to recover fast and cannot afford to let one bad call flatten the next ten.

Delivered as a half-day session, on-site with your team, or for a bit more, on a real stage at a working comedy venue.


Especially relevant for: Sales Directors, BDR and SDR Team Leaders, Heads of Business Development, Chief Revenue Officers and L&D Leaders responsible for how their teams perform under pressure

Why Work with Alfie Noakes

Alfie Noakes founded We Are Funny Project after 25 years across BBC journalism, television production and live comedy.

Alfie spent 15 years in live comedy. He produced around 1,800 shows and MC'd more than 1,000 of them. He generated more than 10,000 comedian slots across that period, shared stages with James Acaster, Sindhu Vee, Stewart Lee, Josh Widdicombe, Marcus Brigstocke and many more.

Alfie personally observed approximately 7,000 performers, including more than 500 on their very first gig, watching many of them grow from nervous beginners into confident stage presences.

More relevantly for this workshop, he watched hundreds of people face public failure, recover in real time and improve under the fastest, most unforgiving feedback loop there is.

That experience now informs his work with sales teams and business professionals who need to handle pressure, rejection and live communication more effectively.

This is not generic resilience training. It is practical coaching built on years of observing what actually helps people recover, adapt and perform more consistently under sustained pressure.

That is the experience this workshop draws on.

Why this workshop matters for your team

Most training teaches what to say.
It rarely teaches how to recover when things go wrong

Outbound teams work in one of the most rejection-heavy environments in business.

That is not a flaw in the job. It is the job.

The problem is what happens when rejection accumulates.
One rough call bleeds into the next.
Tone flattens.
Confidence narrows.
People become more brittle, more scripted and progressively less effective across the day.

Emotional stacking is one of the most under-addressed performance problems in sales.

Repeated rejection does not just affect performance.
For many people in outbound roles it affects confidence, mental resilience and how they feel about the job itself.

This workshop addresses that directly, giving people practical tools to protect their energy, separate identity from outcome and stay psychologically steady across a high-volume day.


• Regain composure faster after difficult calls
• Stay more effective when things go wrong
• Reduce emotional carry-over between conversations
• Notice what is not working and adapt more intelligently
• Communicate with more warmth, adaptability and presence

WHY THIS APPROACH MAKEs SENSE

Cold calling is back.
The question is whether your team is ready for it

Email open rates are falling and outreach tools are everywhere, so more companies are leaning back on direct human contact as what actually sets them apart. That puts BDR and SDR teams under more pressure than ever: live, on the phone, in real time, with a real person who might not want to hear from them at all.

You can train someone in a script. Nobody trains them for what happens after the fifteenth rejection of the day, when tone flattens, confidence narrows, and the weight of the last nine calls quietly leaks into the tenth.

Fifteen years and around 1,800 shows taught me many things about such moments. After all, who knows more about bombing, about needing to be resilient, to pick themselves up and press forward, than emerging comedy talent?

Infographic showing how stand-up skills transfer to sales resilience
This workshop transfers those mechanics directly into a client-facing context. No comedy required.

What your team will learn

Practical skills with immediate value

This workshop is not a lecture on positivity and it is not generic sales coaching.

It is hands-on communication training for people working in live, difficult, high-pressure environments.

Delegates leave with tools they can use on the very next call.

Building
resilient habits

Leave with a personal system for maintaining energy, focus and effectiveness across a full day of outbound activity, not just the first hour.

Sounding
more human

Use warmth, ease and genuine presence to sound less like a script and more like a person worth talking to.

Handling objections and unpredictability

Respond with composure when the script breaks, the answer is unexpected or the prospect goes somewhere you did not anticipate.

Recovering
faster

Learn simple, practical reset tools that stop one rough interaction contaminating the next. The comedian's equivalent of wiping the slate and going again.

Staying steady
in difficult moments

Understand what pressure does to voice, thinking and body language, and develop the self-regulation habits that keep performance more consistent.

Learning
from what is not working

Notice patterns more clearly, adapt your approach more intelligently and improve the quality of future calls rather than simply increasing their volume.

What the session covers

The outline below reflects a strong baseline version of the workshop.

The emphasis can shift depending on your team, your goals and the kind of sales environment they are working in.

Before the call, resilience reframed

Why rejection is inevitable, what it actually signals and how to stop treating it as personal failure.

Power posture, breathing and a deliberate mindset, established before anyone dials.

Staying lighter under pressure

Levity is a stress buster, which makes it a resilience tool in its own right.

How comedy uses lightness on purpose to cut stress in the room, and how the same principle works on a sales floor.

Reset and recovery

Simple, repeatable techniques for resetting between calls.

Practised live in the room using the team's own real rejections, not scripted examples.

Catching
the internal dialogue

How harsh self-talk after a bad call gets caught and reworded in real time, so it stops compounding across a day of calls.

Multiple techniques to sharpen focus, quieten self-criticism and build resilience.

After
the call

How to close the loop at the end of a session or a day, so rejection does not compound or follow people home.

Deliberately small, delightfully simple.

Alfie Noakes smiling at the camera at FIS event with we are funny project logo in the background

Take the workshop into a live comedy venue

Choose a workshop in a working comedy venue, a private bespoke comedy show, or combine both into a day that develops your team and ends with something genuinely worth talking about.

Professional photographers can capture the whole occasion if you would like individual portraits, group and team shots taken.

Very happy team photo of a broad ranging group gathered on a stage laughing and smiling on their away day with one person face obscured by an emoji for privacy reasons

Away day workshop

A workshop delivered on a real stage in a working comedy venue. All the practical value of the core workshops, in a setting that makes the day feel genuinely different

Private comedy show

A one-off company event featuring professional comedians and bespoke material written around your people, your industry and your culture. The tone is agreed with you in advance

Combined experience

Workshop by day, unique stand-up show by night. Skills, shared laughter and one memory that will outlast any standard away day

Pricing and formats

Prices reflect a strong baseline version of the workshop.

Tailored content, travel outside London or additional coaching may affect the final fee.

This includes a pre-session conversation to shape the day around your team.

Relevant for Sales Directors, BDR and SDR Team Leaders, Heads of Business Development, Chief Revenue Officers and anyone responsible for how their sales team performs and communicates under pressure.

Half-day on-site
From £1,800

A focused, practical session delivered at your premises

Duration: 3 hours

Ideal group size: 8 to 10 people

Best for: a targeted intervention on rejection handling, staying steady under pressure and live communication

Style: led as a dialogue rather than a lecture, delegates stay together in the room throughout, with live recovery drills built around the team's own real rejections

Result: people leave with a clearer understanding of rejection, stronger reset habits and better composure at the start of each new conversation

Half-day at a comedy venue
From £3,000

The same session, delivered on a real stage in a working London comedy venue

Duration: 3 hours (typically an afternoon slot, circa 2pm to 5pm)


Ideal group size: 8 to 10 people


Best for: teams who want the full Bomb Proof: Sales Resilience Under Pressure experience in a setting that powerfully changes the energy

Style: identical format to the on-site session, delivered with a mic in a venue built for live performance


Result: everything the half-day
delivers, in an environment that makes
the whole experience genuinely different

Half-day plus an evening show
From £4,250

The workshop, followed by a comedy show for your wider team that evening

Duration: 3-hour workshop in the afternoon, evening show to follow. Timings are discussed on a case-by-case basis


Ideal group size: 8 to 10 for the workshop, open group size for the evening show


Best for: teams who want to turn the day into a full company event

Style: the workshop runs exactly as the comedy venue session. The tone, talent and timings are bespoke, per client wishes.


Result: everything the workshop delivers, plus a shared evening the company will still be talking about afterwards


The evening is an opportunity to bring in a wider company audience for a private bespoke comedy show. Thirty, fifty or more people. Prices reflect the absolute baseline. Expect to pay more for a show featuring better-known comedians and/or creating fresh comedy material based on your directions and suggestions.

A natural extension of the day that turns a team workshop into a company event. Show pricing is by quote. Ask on the discovery call.


Not sure which format is right for your team?

Start with a 25-minute discovery call.

No hard sell. Just a focused conversation about your goals, your team size and which option makes the most sense.

Why this workshop works

Practical tools, not motivational wallpaper

Difficult moments change everything.

They affect tone, breathing, confidence, listening and the quality of what someone says next.


Most resilience training tells people to stay positive. This workshop shows them how.


The difference is practical mechanics: what to do in the ten seconds after a rough call, how to separate identity from outcome, how to recognise what is not working and adjust rather than repeat it.


The goal is not inspiration. It is a team that performs more consistently, communicates more humanly and recovers faster when the pressure is on.

The thinking behind this workshop is explored further in this piece on what stand-up comedy teaches sales teams about rejection and resilience.

A track record you can verify

Across workshops, gigs, one-to-one coaching and online courses, Alfie's work has attracted nearly 1,000 reviews with an average rating of 4.9 out of 5.

No other communication trainer in this space has built that volume of verified feedback from real participants.

Bomb Proof has been delivered to real sales people, with the results to prove it. Read the full ratings and delegate feedback from the FIS case study below.

Explore more workshops

Bomb Proof is one route into the work.

If your team needs something different, or something that complements this workshop, these may be a better fit.

Confident
Client Engagement

For teams who need to present more confidently, hold the room more effectively and communicate with greater authority in high-stakes moments.

Best for: pitches, presentations, stakeholder conversations and client-facing delivery

Developing
Stronger Ideas

For teams who need sharper thinking and stronger development of material before delivery even begins. Particularly useful for creative, strategy and planning teams

Best for: idea generation, sharper messaging and creative thinking

The
Levity Works

For teams who want warmer communication, stronger team culture and a more connected way of working, particularly for leadership groups and people-focused teams.

Best for: morale, trust and more human team dynamics

Ready to find out if Bomb Proof is right for your team

Start with a 25-minute discovery call. No hard sell.

Just a focused conversation to work out whether this is the right kind of help and, if so, exactly what that looks like for your team.

Curious about the research behind this? Read why resilience holds up better as a technique than a mindset.

People also ask


Why is it called Bomb Proof?


In stand-up comedy, bombing means failing on stage, getting no laughs. A performer who is "bomb proof" is one who has an essential skill: they can take a bad set, move on cleanly, and in fact learn from what went wrong to make the future all the more effective. That is exactly what this workshop builds in sales teams. The ability to absorb rejection, reset quickly and show up fully for the next call without carrying the weight of the last one.

Who is this workshop best suited to?
Bomb Proof: Sales Resilience Under Pressure is designed for outbound sales teams and other high-rejection commercial roles where people need to stay composed, adaptable and effective under pressure. That includes BDRs, SDRs, outbound sales teams, call-based commercial teams and leaders responsible for improving how their teams handle rejection, objections and difficult live conversations. It is also relevant for L&D and HR teams looking to address the mental health impact of sustained rejection on outbound staff, particularly where confidence dips, energy loss or increased attrition are concerns.

Can the workshop be tailored to our team?
Yes. The page outlines a strong baseline version of the workshop, but the emphasis can shift depending on your team, your goals and the kind of sales environment they are working in. Some teams need more focus on recovery and resilience. Others want greater emphasis on objection handling, adapting when the script breaks, or learning from what is not working.

What are the payment terms?
Our standard terms are 50 percent on booking and the balance within 14 days of delivery. For larger organisations with established payment processes, we are happy to discuss terms that work for both sides. Just raise it on the discovery call.

Is this about teaching people to be funny on sales calls?
No. Sales teams don't leave this workshop as comedians, and nobody is teaching them jokes for the phone. What they do leave with are the mechanics strong live performers rely on: establishing fast rapport, gaining attention with a strong opening hook, recovering when something goes wrong, reading the room, adapting on the spot, staying composed, timing, vocal inflection and the subtle use of body language (that actually influences tone on the telephone.) All of it aimed at helping people handle rejection better and communicate more effectively under pressure.


Is this a sales script workshop?
No, not in the main. This workshop focuses on how people recover, reset, stay effective and learn from live interactions when things do not go to plan. If your team needs more support with script development, messaging or sharpening the material itself, that can be discussed separately or paired with another workshop where appropriate.

What group size works best?
Workshops are typically designed for around 8 to 10 people to allow for real depth, practice and feedback. Smaller groups allow for even more individual attention. Larger groups can still be accommodated, but the delivery may need to be adjusted to suit the format and goals.


Do you include live practice or roleplay?
Yes. This workshop works best when people have the chance to apply the ideas, not just hear about them. Delegates take part in live recovery drills using real rejections gathered from the room itself, not scripted examples, a deliberate choice to keep the material honest rather than hypothetical.


Do you travel?
Yes. Workshops are usually delivered in person, and travel can absolutely be discussed in advance. For bookings outside London, additional travel costs may apply, and for longer-distance work, accommodation may also need to be covered. All of that is agreed clearly before anything is confirmed.

Infrequently asked questions

If the Cookie Monster were placed in charge of a biscuit company's annual budget, at what point in the fiscal year would the board intervene?

February. Specifically the third week.

The Cookie Monster's documented relationship with biscuits, or cookies, as he insists on calling them despite being, nominally, British-adjacent, is not one of moderation. It is one of complete structural surrender in the presence of the product.

This creates an obvious conflict of interest for any senior financial role in the biscuit sector, and yet the interview would presumably have gone very well because he is enormously enthusiastic and interviewers tend to mistake enthusiasm for competence.

January would pass without incident. The Cookie Monster is not without intelligence and would understand, in the abstract, that Q1 requires restraint. He would prepare spreadsheets. He would attend meetings. 

The collapse would begin around January 23rd, when the first quarterly product review required him to spend four hours in a room with the entire catalogue. Witnesses would later describe it as "moving very fast for someone in that role" and "unprecedented in terms of the sheer volume."

By the third week of February the R&D budget, the marketing allocation, the staff biscuit allowance and approximately 40 percent of the capital reserves would be gone. 

The board would convene on February 19th. The vote to remove him would be unanimous but not without sympathy. He would be given a reference describing him as "passionate about the product."

This would be accurate.

What is the technical term for the fear of being watched by a duck?

Anatidaephobia.

This is a real entry in psychological literature, defined specifically as the fear that somewhere, somehow, a duck is watching you.

Not that a duck is nearby. Not that a duck is aggressive. Simply that one is observing you, from an unspecified location, with unknowable intent.

It was coined by cartoonist Gary Larson in a Far Side panel in 1988 as a joke.

The psychological community, to its credit, received it with sufficient seriousness that it entered informal clinical usage and has remained there ever since.

Whether this reflects the broadmindedness of modern psychology or the persuasive power of a good cartoon is a matter of interpretation.

The duck in question is never specified. This is important. It is not a particular duck with a grievance. It is the abstract, generalised concept of duck observation.

The sufferer does not fear being attacked. They fear being regarded. Assessed. Noted.

What is the name for the phenomenon where you can't remember a word that is right on the tip of your tongue?

Lethologica.

It comes from the Greek lethe, the river of forgetfulness in the underworld, and logos, meaning word. The ancient Greeks had a mythological explanation for forgetting and it involved a river. This seems excessive but also, if you have ever stood in a conversation absolutely certain that the word you need exists and simply will not arrive, not entirely unreasonable.

Neuroscientists describe the tip-of-the-tongue state as a form of incomplete activation, the brain has located the correct filing cabinet, opened the correct drawer and is staring directly at the right piece of paper, but cannot quite read it.

The word is retrieved in approximately 90 percent of cases within a minute.

The remaining 10 percent arrive at 3am, fully formed, with nobody left to tell.

If animals could speak, which would be the rudest?

While there is no way of knowing fur sure, entirely imagined scientific research has concluded that it would probably be a breed from France, most likely Paris, in fact. So you can be confident that a French bulldog is likely quite the curt pain in the seating pads.

Either that or a Lamb. Yeah, I know that's surprising, they look so cute, but they curse like sailors and have dreadful queueing etiquette. At least, that's what the Sheep Dogs told me.
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