[4] In addition, Johnson was on the board of governors of the Toronto Stock Exchange from 1978 to 1980 and served as Chairman of the Investment Dealers Association of Canada from 1988 to 1989.
Johnson is a director and chairman emeritus of the Council for Business and the Arts in Canada, and a member of the Major Individual Gifts Campaign Cabinet of the United Way of Greater Toronto.
He is a former board member of the Bishop Strachan School Foundation and of the National Ballet of Canada.
In 1996-97, he chaired a successful $13 million capital campaign to build a new home in Toronto for the National Ballet.
Johnson has played the lead role on behalf of the Canadian charitable sector in lobbying the federal government to remove tax barriers for gifts of publicly listed securities to registered charities.
[10] He was promoted to Officer in 2009 "for his key role in changing Canada’s tax laws to eliminate the capital gains tax on gifts of publicly traded securities to registered charities, and for his support of health care research and the arts".