About PayneCleary
The PayneCleary name was established in 2026, but the work behind it began in 1997.
Brian Delfino began working in executive search with a well-known global search firm in 1997 and was entrusted with retained assignments during his first year. He quickly recognized that executive search was not simply a natural career transition. It was the one profession that brought together everything he valued: building, creating value, developing strategy, and delivering meaningful solutions.
Executive search offered the opportunity to partner and collaborate with clients, understand what they were working to accomplish, develop the right strategy and execute together. It created a way to strengthen businesses through their people while building trusting relationships, lasting friendships, and meaningful memories through work accomplished together.
Three years later, Brian founded Structural Integrity, Inc. The name reflected his belief that enduring organizations are built upon a strong foundation and that the right leadership provides the structural integrity necessary to grow, adapt and succeed. He takes great pride in the privilege of having contributed to the growth and success of so many clients and candidates throughout his career.
In 2026, the practice became PayneCleary Executive Search, carrying forward the experience, relationships and commitment established over more than 26 years as an independent search firm.
Purpose
We recruit leaders who raise organizational capability, build high-performing teams and future leaders, strengthen execution and sharpen competitive advantage. Whether building a startup, establishing a carve-out, integrating an acquisition, scaling for growth, preparing for a transaction or repositioning an established company, we recruit for the leadership required to build value and sustain results.
We begin by understanding the organization, its culture, the leadership mandate and what must be accomplished. A clearly defined mandate produces a sharper profile, a more focused search and better candidates.
Once the mandate is clear, we take it from there. We lead the search with urgency, communicate directly and remain personally involved and accountable through selection, offer acceptance, resignation, and transition.
Clients and candidates trust us with sensitive information, consequential decisions and professional reputations. We handle every conversation and relationship with discretion, honesty and respect.
Experience may establish relevance, but it does not determine success. We evaluate how a leader thinks, decides, communicates, builds teams, responds to adversity and approaches the work ahead.
The right hire must do more than fill today's position. We recruit leaders capable of raising organizational capability, strengthening execution and preparing the business for its next stage of growth, change, or transformation.
Brian Delfino began his career in industrial sales and project management after serving six years in Air Terminal Operations with the United States Air National Guard. He moved into executive search with a well-known global search firm in 1997, then joined a specialized boutique search firm in the Boston area as Managing Director before founding Structural Integrity, Inc. in 2000. That independent practice became PayneCleary Executive Search in 2026.
Brian works directly with business owners, private equity sponsors, CHROs, hiring authorities and those responsible for consequential leadership decisions to understand the business need, define the right profile and recruit the individual capable of delivering the intended results.
His work spans industrial manufacturing, capital equipment, building materials, engineered products, industrial technology, automation, software, growth companies, and private equity portfolio businesses. He remains personally involved in the strategy, candidate engagement, assessment, and successful completion of every search the firm leads.
B. Christopher Delfino, Jr. joined PayneCleary Executive Search in 2026, bringing a strong background in consultative sales, client development, negotiation and relationship management. He attended the University of South Carolina's Darla Moore School of Business, where he studied finance.
Christopher contributes to market research, candidate identification, direct engagement and search execution while continuing to build deeper expertise across industrial organizations and leadership functions.
His approach reflects the standards that define PayneCleary: preparation, direct communication, professional persistence and respect for every client and candidate relationship.
Begin a Confidential Conversation
Growth, succession, acquisition integration, a business combination, turnaround, reorganization or a critical leadership change, each demands something different from the next leader. We begin with a direct, confidential conversation about the business, the mandate, what must change and the likely profile capable of moving it forward.