Given an uncountable regular cardinal κ, a partial order is κ-stationarily layered if the collection of regular suborders of P of cardinality less than κ is stationary in P κ (P). We show that weak compactness can be characterized by this property of partial orders by proving that an uncountable regular cardinal κ is weakly compact if and only if every partial order satisfying the κ-chain condition is κ-stationarily layered. We prove a similar result for strongly inaccessible cardinals. Moreover, we show that the statement that all κ-Knaster partial orders are κ-stationarily layered implies that κ is a Mahlo cardinal and every stationary subset of κ reflects. This shows that this statement characterizes weak compactness in canonical inner models. In contrast, we show that it is also consistent that this statement holds at a non-weakly compact cardinal.