Greater Toronto's Top Employers (2025) Magazine - Flipbook - Page 52
52
( 2025 )
SPONSOR CONTENT
Crown empowers employees to grow in their careers
W
ithin five years at
Crown Property
Management
Inc., Prasaanth
Ganesalingam has quickly
climbed the career ladder. And the
company has supported him every
step of the way.
Crown, a commercial real estate
investment and management
company founded in 2001, has put
a focus on coaching, mentorship
and financial support for professional development courses since
its early days, which Les Miller,
Crown’s CEO and managing partner, says is part of the company’s
commitment to fostering a strong
culture.
The company makes coaching
part of all managers’ annual
goals to help their team members
advance in their careers and
subsidizes the cost of job-related
continuing education or courses
that would help an employee grow
in their role or move into another
department within Crown.
When Ganesalingam started
at the company as a junior
property accountant, he received
mentorship from more senior
team members who showed him
what he’d need to do to grow
his career. While he pursued his
chartered professional accountant
designation, Crown covered the
course fees and now subsidizes his
annual dues and any necessary
continuing education courses.
“Having that financial support
and mentorship helped me
progress the way that I did,” says
Ganesalingam, now a manager,
property accounting. “Everyone
here is given the same opportunities, there’s always someone at
a senior level willing to mentor
junior staff, and there’s opportunity to develop our skills and grow
into a more senior position.”
One of the company’s most
important initiatives, Miller says,
is leadership training for new
managers. Crown partnered with
York University’s Schulich School
of Business more than 10 years
ago to provide training to newly
promoted leaders.
“We feel it is extremely
important our leaders know how
to lead,” he says. “In a small company you promote people from
within, often to managerial roles.
Too many companies make the
mistake of expecting that because
someone’s good at the technical
aspects of the job, they can be
promoted to a manager role and
teach someone else to do their
job but fail to notice that there’s a
different skillset involved.”
Last year, when Ganesalingam
was promoted to his current role,
the company offered him and
other new managers training at
Schulich for emotional intelligence that helped managers
identify their strengths and
areas to work on, and some tips
for improving their emotional
awareness.
“Having that financial
support and mentorship
helped me progress the way
that I did.”
— Prasaanth Ganesalingam
Manager, Property Accounting
Employees at Crown Property Management are encouraged to give back to the community through paid time
off to volunteer.
“It helped me build the
strengths I needed to manage my
team, given that I’m new to the
role,” he says.
Crown also has an emerging
leaders program for employees
identified by their managers or
colleagues as having leadership
capabilities. Many of these emerging leaders participate in Crown’s
mentorship program, which was
launched in 2023. The program
has received an “overwhelming”
positive response from employees
within its first year: one-third of
