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Public Interest

Building a Better Federal Retiree Experience from the Ground Up

We replaced an outdated retirement adjudication system with Janus—a customized, human-centered tool that streamlines retirement benefit workflows.

The Challenge: Building Better Tech While Preserving Legacy Information

Client name(s):
Office of Personnel Management’s (OPM), Office of Retirement Services (RS)
Partner name(s):
Ad Hoc, Blue Tiger, Element Solutions, Flexion
Delivery date:
March 2025

An aging retirement application couldn’t support an aging federal workforce.

The Office of Personnel Management (OPM) manages the largest retirement program in the US, overseeing retirement claims for more than two million federal employees and processing approximately 89,000 new claims annually. Until recently, OPM relied on the Federal Annuity Claims Expert System (FACES)—an archaic system built using Visual Basic 6 that legal administrative specialists (LASs) used to evaluate federal employee retirement applications and verify the calculation of retiree and survivor benefits. 

This legacy technology was increasingly difficult and costly to maintain. It also suffered from limited scalability, inefficient workflows, and reliance on institutional knowledge living in the minds of an aging workforce approaching retirement.

Adjudicating federal retirement claims is inherently complex, requiring precise calculations aligned with evolving rules and regulations. The legacy system’s technological limitations exacerbated these complexities, causing delays, errors, and lengthy onboarding processes for LASs, who required 6-12 months of training to fully learn the system. Additionally, integrating new functionality or responding swiftly to legislative changes was nearly impossible with the existing infrastructure.

Recognizing these challenges, OPM sought a modern, future-ready solution that could streamline and improve retirement adjudication workflows, preserve institutional knowledge, reduce processing time, and enhance the user experience for LASs. 

Team Coforma’s initial project scope focused primarily on user interface and front-end enhancements to FACES. However, recognizing critical dependencies on a struggling calculation engine being developed by a large consultancy, our engineering team stepped in. With OPM’s trust, we took over the development of a fully customized Calculation Service, quickly delivering necessary improvements and eliminating the need for expensive, off-the-shelf software licensing.

Janus replaces OPM's legacy retirement services application. A screen on the left with an anonymized, outdated form. It's connected by an arrow to a screen with the Janus logo, a key in an arched doorway, symbolizing a modernized product.

Over the last four years, Team Coforma (joined at various stages of development by our subcontracting partners from Ad Hoc, Blue Tiger, Element Solutions, and Flexion) has worked closely with OPM through multiple phases of iterative design, agile development, and phased deployment of the Janus system. 

This fully customized, human-centered application includes a front-end, API, database, and calculation engine. Janus went into a production environment on March 15, 2025. Once fully implemented, it aims to significantly improve calculation accuracy, reduce training times, streamline user workflows, and establish a sustainable platform capable of adapting quickly to future changes.

“This is really really good stuff, and I appreciate what y’all are doing, I appreciate the ability to communicate it to RS Leadership. Keep on trucking folks. This is going to be a great product.”
OPM Stakeholder

Our Approach: Human-Centered, Integrated, Iterative, and Agile

We listened to people doing the actual work to understand what they needed, then iteratively built an application that exceeded expectations.

When Team Coforma initially partnered with OPM, we knew we needed to do more than replace an outdated system. So, we set out to build something uniquely tailored to the needs of the LASs who handle thousands of retirement claims each year. 

We leaned into an iterative, human-centered design (HCD) approach anchored by regular conversations with LASs about their day-to-day experiences, workflows, and challenges. Combining one-on-one interviews, group design workshops, and regular co-design working sessions, we were able to achieve a nuanced understanding of how these employees interact with digital tools to do their jobs.

Every two weeks, our UX team met with these specialists, validating design decisions through real-world feedback and making iterative improvements based on insights they provided. This lean UX methodology allowed the Janus platform to evolve around real user needs rather than assumptions. Our agile approach enabled rapid prototyping, deployment of incremental improvements, and ongoing collaboration with OPM to adjust priorities based on evolving project needs.

HCD by the Numbers Three blue boxes highlighting the following stats: 98 1:1 LAS usability tests, 42 Co-design Sessions, 52 Stakeholder working sessions

Rather than operating in siloed teams, we assembled an integrated Scrum team comprising UX designers, engineers, DevSecOps experts, product managers, accessibility specialists, and more. This integrated team structure—praised by project members as “the most integrated team they’ve ever worked on”—meant we didn’t develop any aspect of the project in isolation. We embedded accessibility considerations from the beginning, guided by a full-time accessibility expert for multiple project phases.

We balanced innovation and practical constraints, delicately integrating modern technology solutions into legacy mainframe infrastructure. By collaborating closely with OPM stakeholders, communicating transparently about progress, and building incremental trust, we were able to develop a lasting partnership and deliver a scalable, user-centric solution capable of handling increasingly complex federal retirement calculations.

“The team has accomplished exceptional work to get us to this point. Documentation, 508 testing and corrections, firewall request, scanning issues, Azure environment configurations, and more that normally take weeks to complete have been done in a bit over four days. Amazing effort!”
OPM Stakeholder

Results: A Tailored Solution That Streamlines Complex Workflows

Reliable and easy for OPM to maintain, Janus was built with modern technology and deployed in OPM’s secure Azure cloud environment. Creating an application that LASs can use efficiently—and depend on for accuracy—allows them to serve federal retirees, annuitants, and survivors by calculating their benefits correctly and promptly. 

Stylized illustration of an online form on a blue background with the Janus logo in the corner

Fully Customized Calculation Service

Team Coforma built a fully customized Calculation Service aligned with OPM’s goals and LASs’ needs. Our design team created fresh branding for the product, including a logo inspired by Janus—the Roman god of liminal spaces—to represent LASs guiding retirees through a major life transition. We used familiar US Web Design System (USWDS) components to maintain a consistent user experience across government platforms. Engineers introduced updated frontend and backend services built explicitly for claims adjudication and calculation processes that seamlessly integrated with OPM’s existing MS-SQL databases and legacy mainframe systems. The resulting product is an intuitive, reliable application hosted securely on the cloud that boasts improved accuracy, usability, accessibility, and operational efficiency.

Animation of small check and plus signs appearing around a large checkmark in a shield, representing enhanced accuracy and reduced errors

Enhanced Accuracy, Reduced Errors

Janus is poised to improve the accuracy and reliability of retirement benefit calculations, directly addressing the risk of costly errors inherent in the previous legacy system. The tool will help minimize computational and human errors during claims adjudication, resulting in greater confidence among LASs, clearer outcomes for retirees, and fewer delays in claims processing.

Illustration of a person wearing headphones sitting in front of a computer screen with notes next to the keyboard during an online fully accessible training module.

Modern Instructional Design Approach

To support a full transition of FACES users to the new Janus application, we adopted a modern instructional design approach, delivering integrated “training as hints” LASs can access on demand. Breaking away from overly formal, sage-on-a-stage training, we delivered fully accessible training modules with scripts and videos showing users how to perform significant Janus tasks. This will give LASs more autonomy and flexibility as they onboard to Janus.

Stylized workflow chart representing a blueprint for cloud modernization efforts on a blue background

Blueprint for Future Modernization Efforts

As one of the early adopters of cloud services at OPM, Team Coforma helped pave the way for modernizing its technology stacks. Hosted in a secure Azure cloud environment, Janus sets a replicable model for future federal modernization initiatives at OPM and beyond. Our iterative, human-centered approach can serve as a template for agile, responsive development other government agencies can follow.

Technology

  • HTML, CSS (with SCSS), React (with Redux): Frontend development

  • Node.js: Backend development 

  • Microsoft SQL Server, PostgreSQL: Databases

  • Docker: Containerization

  • Terraform: Infrastructure as Code

  • GitHub: Code storage and version control

  • GitHub Actions: CI/CD and automation

  • GitHub Projects, Trello, Azure DevOps: Issue tracking and Agile workflows 

  • Mural, Lucid: Remote collaboration and brainstorming

  • Google Suite (Drive, Sheets, Docs), OneDrive: Documentation and file storage

  • Slack: Internal communication

  • Zoom, Microsoft Teams: Virtual meetings

  • Figma: Interaction Design

  • US Web Design System (USWDS): Design components and standards

  • Optimal Workshop: Online surveying

  • Dovetail: Insight Repository

  • Google Sheets: Research synthesis

  • Cypress: Frontend Testing

  • Azure Data Studio, Visual Studio Code, DBeaver: Database management 

  • WAVE, HTML_CodeSniffer, Accessibility Insights: Accessibility testing

  • Adobe Acrobat: PDF document generation 

Practices

  • Human-centered design 

  • Agile software development

  • Manual accessibility testing

  • Heuristic evaluation by usability experts

  • Open and closed survey questionnaires

  • Service-oriented architecture

  • Building DevOps automation tools