Spara CEO David Walker says hiring sets company culture

By Nathan Brooks

David Walker said he once fired two high performers at a prior company after they failed to collaborate, a decision more than a dozen colleagues later backed.

Walker said neither dismissal followed a blowup or misconduct. The employees tried to prove they were smarter than their colleagues instead of collaborating. Walker offered feedback, but nothing changed.

“The thing that most CEOs get wrong is that they make hiring decisions and then they go try to set their culture,” Walker said.

After the decision, more than a dozen staff told Walker he had made the right call. “I could see a marked change in the energy and culture,” he said. Employees also began referring more job candidates. Walker’s only regret was that he had spent months agonizing over the decision before acting.

Walker cofounded Spara in 2024. The startup builds AI agents for sales teams and has about two dozen employees. Before Spara, Walker cofounded and ran a tech-enabled real estate brokerage. He later sold the brokerage.

Culture starts with the hiring decision

Walker said culture is not defined by whether a company has a ping-pong table or a “corporate-feeling office.” It takes shape through the people the company hires and rewards.

“Hiring decisions are the bedrock of setting your culture,” he said.

The best advice Walker has received, he said, is blunt: “If you don't feel like the dumbest person at your company, you're just bad at hiring.” He said he wants “self-imposed imposter syndrome,” meaning capable employees should not assume their expertise makes them superior to colleagues.

Talent alone is not Walker’s test. He said the trait most correlated with the culture he wants is whether someone gains energy by bringing those around them up or pushing them down.

Walker’s example starts with an employee who does 80% of the work. At an all-hands meeting, that employee credits colleagues who handle the rest and says the result would not have been possible without them. “They’re sharing the credit,” Walker said.

Walker said workers who need to “win” interactions may treat colleagues’ ideas as threats. Employees who draw out other people’s ideas and knowledge are more likely to foster genuine collaboration.

What should hiring managers test?

The practical question is what a hiring manager should look for before making an offer. Walker’s answer has two parts: check how a candidate treats colleagues, and test whether the person feels comfortable challenging leaders.

First, determine whether the candidate gains energy by bringing colleagues up or pushing them down. Second, see whether the candidate can challenge a decision and engage with the reasoning behind it. Expertise alone does not clear the bar.

That second test applies directly to Walker as CEO. He said employees need expertise in their business functions and also need to feel comfortable challenging him. In return, Walker must explain how he reached a decision, not merely announce the answer.

Disagreement needs a decision rule

Walker said a leader also defines how a company communicates and makes decisions. Early in his career, he struggled to say no to people on his leadership team who were older or more experienced in their area. He adopted an employee’s suggestion: explain the reasoning before delivering the final answer.

That practice gives staff a chance to understand the reasoning, challenge it and learn how Walker weighs trade-offs. “Great people expect to be told 'no,'” he said.

Walker said he believes in disagree and commit, including when he is the one who disagrees. If he rejects a team’s approach but defers to its expertise, he and the team decide in advance how they will judge the result and what they will do if it fails.

One possible measure, he said, is to review sales-call recordings during the first month after a decision and assess whether customers understand the change. Agreeing on a review point can make a later reversal easier because the team planned for it rather than treating it as a blunder.

That keeps decisions moving. “The worst thing you can do building a company is just have decisions that don't get made,” Walker said.

For managers, the implication is concrete: hiring, credit and disagreement cannot be separated from culture. As Walker builds out Spara, his model puts employee behavior and explicit decision reviews ahead of workplace perks.