I see the first thing many say about M&A is that it is modelling intensive – highly technical.
Please correct me if I’m wrong but from my personal experience, while this is true to some extent, M&A is a lot more process-oriented than analysis-oriented. What you really do as an M&A banker is you handhold your client throughout the M&A process and be the coordinator for all parties involved, especially for sell-side.
You do get to learn a lot as an M&A banker though as you get to see all major aspects of a company as you go through DD, and you get to be involved in C-suite level situations as M&A is often a C-suite decision. It is a comprehensive experience and hence the wide range of exit opps. In terms of financial analysis alone, I see other groups / jobs like LevFin, FSG or Financial DD at big 4 tend to be more technical.
I’m in APAC region so it might be very different elsewhere, and this is from my personal experience. Feel free to discuss and please correct me if I’m wrong.
Sounds like you’ve experienced process sell sides (i.e. auctions). They are highly process-oriented, with the only modeling being the sell-side model (which is essentially reformatting the management numbers) and (maybe) a illustrative LBO for staple financing,
Any other type of project would likely be more technical - bilateral processes, buy sides, minority investments etc. That’s because there’s more scrutiny of value and more negotiations between parties (client management and client board, client management and other party) that different analyses can aid.