I would answer this by saying, “I am focused on IB roles, and it is definitely my top choice. That said, I am applying to a few other deal and M&A-related roles as backup options, but I’m spending almost all my time and energy on IB applications.”

In the article you state:

“Everything else will be a “common sense” question (“Are you just applying to investment banking roles?”) or a question about your understanding of the industry.”

Maybe I lack common sense, but what is the best answer to this question? I was recently asked this in an IB interview and I said I’ve also been interviewing for other roles as backups, including Credit Analyst roles (since I currently work in commercial lending) and an M&A T.A.S. Analyst role at an accounting firm.

That’s not a good weakness because you usually don’t want to discuss medical/drug issues in interviews. You normally want to cite something that is linked to your personality and not external factors.

If the deals are small, find larger deals with more information done by the other offices.

Have an IB interview soon. If the firm’s office that I’m applying to doesn’t have deals that are big enough to disclose financials (they work on deals between $100mm and $1Bn and are usually PE funds or private companies buying out other companies) should I focus on looking for the details of those deals or could I potentially use a deal in a tangentially related industry done by one of their other offices?

Thank you!

Your actual story can be longer than 30 seconds, but you should have a “quick version” that is about that long.

I would not use that as a weakness. It’s better to talk about something more general, such as one of the ones mentioned here. You don’t really want to go into a job where they’re already skeptical of your finance knowledge and then admit that they should be skeptical.