Case Study: Sunshine Coast Credit Union achieves top McKinsey Bottom‑Up Innovation scores and 95% employee participation with IdeaScale

Improving Scores in the McKinsey Organizational Health

Sunshine Coast Credit Union (SCCU) is a $700M+ cooperative financial institution serving 17,300 members across three locations with a mission to reinvest in the local community. After a 2018 McKinsey Organizational Health Index assessment revealed Bottom‑Up Innovation as their weakest area, SCCU needed a way to engage employees in continuous improvement and increase innovation capacity.

SCCU launched an IdeaScale community called “Better Every Day,” backed by executive sponsorship, incentives, and monthly campaigns with quarterly leader reviews. The program achieved 95% initial participation, averages at least one idea per employee, has implemented 20% of suggestions within a year, and lifted Bottom‑Up Innovation from the lowest to the highest OHI score while improving leadership and learning & development metrics.

Sunshine Coast Credit Union

Alex Kostenko

Director of Strategy and Innovation