Deutsche Bank interview questions

The interview process consists of an initial interview followed by several "final round" interviews that all took place face-to-face in their ICC office, with the possibility of additional rounds. Each round features two back-to-back 30-minute interviews, during which you will meet interviewers from different sectors within corporate banking. Generally, the questions are behavior-focused, with very few technical questions. I progressed to the third "final round" but was ultimately declined. I think they are looking for candidates with a genuine interest in corporate banking who will remain in the sector for a longer time, rather than individuals who view the job merely as a stepping stone to a role in so-called "high finance."

I was invited to interview for a AML Transaction Monitoring Analyst. I have 3.5 years experience in KYC, which typically is considered very relevant or transferable experience. My interview began okay, despite the interviewer taking what I can only describe as a very stoic or ice cold approach. He was staring off into the distance, supposedly at my resume, but really never stopped to make eye contact at all. The interview questions were strange. Usually you are asked to answer questions in the STAR format, and give specific examples of difficult cases or difficult feedback and how you handled it. Instead, I was bluntly asked yes or no questions or overly open-ended questions (how much did you write in your KYC role?). What do you mean "how much"? The number of words? How many hours in a day? I was also asked to define words. "What is correspondent banking?" This felt more like the first question (the one that's kind of a freebie) on the ACAMS exam. How does defining basic terms allow me to stand out? We only had a half hour and a lot of it was spent on this. Additionally, the interviewer told him they were looking for 1 year transaction monitoring and SAR writing experience. This was not disclosed during the initial screening with the recruiter and was not on the job posting. If it had been, I would not have wasted his time or my time, because it was clear that the majority of my work was in KYC and that I'd only had 3 months direct AML experience. Of course I disagree with the interviewer that it's not transferable - yes KYC is only one of several subcategories of the bank's overall AML framework, but you can't have an AML program without a solid KYC foundation. It was a very strange interview and I left feeling like I was not given a fair shot.