a) The purpose of the rest of the questions is to inform the initial sift, and not later stages of the application, and if you have been referred by a trusted colleague, then there is no further use of the optional questions to the initial sift, so it would be a waste of applicants’ time
b) Saving applicants’ time on the initial application makes you likely to receive more applications to choose from
However, these referrals could indeed have a nepotistic effect by allowing networking to have more of an influence on the ease of getting to stage 2.
I was referred to apply to this job by someone who was close to another hiring round I was in (where I reached the final stage but didn’t get an offer).
Some reasons could be
a) The purpose of the rest of the questions is to inform the initial sift, and not later stages of the application, and if you have been referred by a trusted colleague, then there is no further use of the optional questions to the initial sift, so it would be a waste of applicants’ time
b) Saving applicants’ time on the initial application makes you likely to receive more applications to choose from
However, these referrals could indeed have a nepotistic effect by allowing networking to have more of an influence on the ease of getting to stage 2.
I was referred to apply to this job by someone who was close to another hiring round I was in (where I reached the final stage but didn’t get an offer).