2010 Leadership Award

This year the BC Export Awards are pleased to acknowledge the tremendous positive impact hosting the 2010 Olympic Games brought to British Columbia and the BC export industry.

Mr. Furlong is the leader behind the team that organized and staged the Vancouver 2010 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games. From the very beginning of the project, Mr. Furlong envisioned that the Games could be a true nation builder, helping to improve the fabric of Canadian society. Prior to his appointment at VANOC in 2004, Furlong was the President and Chief Operating Officer for the Vancouver 2010 Bid Corporation. In his role, he became the Bid’s international face and key spokesperson, tirelessly clocking more than 1.2 million miles in his travels to promote the Bid.

Mr. Furlong has been a long time member of the Canadian Olympic Committee and has led many high profile sport organizations in Canada.

Around the Rings Magazine has listed Mr. Furlong as one of the world’s top five most influential Olympic Officials in both 2009 and 2010. Most recently, he was named Sport BC’s Sportsman of the Decade. Mr. Furlong was acclaimed as the 2004 Canadian Sport Awards' Sport Leadership Winner for his service to sport in Canada over a lifetime. He has won Vancouver’s most prestigious tourism award for the promotion of Vancouver around the world and was inducted into the BC Sports Hall of Fame as the 2004 W.A.C. Bennett Award winner. On July 1, 2010, Mr. Furlong was named an Officer of the Order of Canada and received the Order of British Columbia on October 21, 2010.

Under Mr. Furlong's leadership, VANOC drew the world’s attention to BC and its businesses from 2003, when the International Olympic Committee named Vancouver and Whistler as the host cities for the 2010 Winter Games through March 2010 at the closing of the 2010 Winter Paralympic Games.

The 2010 BC Export Awards is pleased to honour Mr. John Furlong for his vision, dedication and outstanding leadership in “Exporting the BC Brand” to the world in 2010.