Optimization Scientist — Healthcare Operations

Turn the hardest operational bottlenecks in healthcare into schedules that actually work. And stay close to the research that shapes them. At Xeeft, every hospital operation is a puzzle. Which surgeon. Which room. Which instruments. Ready exactly when the next case needs them. Behind each of these sits a bottleneck waiting to slow the whole day down. Today that runs on whiteboards, spreadsheets and a coordinator's intuition. We solve it with mathematics. We connect directly to the EHR teams already use. We find the bottlenecks before they form, and we hand back a fully optimised plan in seconds. We're looking for a mathematician who lives and breathes Mixed-Integer Programming. You'll model the messiest, most rewarding operational problems in healthcare. You'll find where the flow breaks, and you'll fix it with math. You'll work hand-in-hand with our Head of Mathematics. The role starts part-time, at 60% for the first month. We designed it that way on purpose, so it balances alongside an ongoing PhD or academic research workload. If it's a fit on both sides, we'll extend it to full time. What you will work on You will stay on the frontier of academic research. You will track what universities are publishing in MIP, scheduling and operations research. Then you'll translate the best of it into our work. You will partner closely with the Head of Mathematics on formulating new cases and enhancing existing models. You will turn real operational bottlenecks into MIP formulations that hold up under real-world constraints. Think OR scheduling, staff rostering, bed allocation, instrument reprocessing, demand forecasting. You will design the objectives that matter. Trays ready in time. Clinicians' hours respected. Rooms never idle. Patients never waiting. And you will push past where exact solvers choke, with branch-and-bound, column generation and heuristics, so a hospital's full daily volume solves fast. You will thrive here if
- You have a PhD, completed or in progress, in Mathematics, Operations Research, Industrial Engineering or similar.
- You have deep MIP expertise.
- You read the literature, and you can spot which new results actually translate into practice.
- You're fluent in modelling languages and solvers, whether that's Gurobi, CPLEX, OR-Tools, Pyomo or JuMP
- You understand scheduling, batch and flow-shop problems
- You know when a problem is NP-hard, and what to do about it.
- You're fluent in Portuguese and English, written and spoken. Healthcare operations exposure is a bonus. So is a genuine love of puzzles. The kind you cannot put down until they are solved. The setup It starts part-time, at 60% for the first month, structured to fit around your PhD or research. If it's a strong fit on both sides, we'll extend it to full time. It's hybrid, with travel across Portugal and Brazil to work with our teams and partner facilities. Why it matters Every bottleneck we clear is a smoother day for a tired team. Every hour we save a coordinator is an hour back with patients. This is mathematics with a pulse. Elegant models that make real healthcare operations run better. A job with purpose, for people who love the proof and the impact equally. Sound like your kind of problem? Xeeft
- the optimization platform for healthcare operations. Optimization Scientist
- Healthcare Operations
- Part Time
- Socorro, Portuguese Republic, PT