My grandfather grew up in Oak Park, Ill., in the early 1900s in the same neighborhood as Ernest Hemingway – in fact, he was a family friend. I always loved Hemingway's concise yet illustrative style of writing and thought it was cool to have that (distant) connection. Some would say he was the greatest storyteller of modern time. Lore says he once made a $10 bet he could write a novel in just six words. On a napkin, he scribbled, "For sale: Baby shoes, never worn," passed it around and promptly collected his earnings.

Hemingway was a genius at not just having a story to tell – we all have stories to tell – but at telling his stories well.

Credit unions – being the cooperative, people-before-profit, socially responsible organizations they are – have meaningful stories to tell that will resonate with today's consumers. But a great story with no one to hear it is like a tree falling in the forest.