Yes he does. He argues that political diversity is most important

> Viewpoint diversity is arguably the most important type of diversity and political orientation is one of the most fundamental and significant ways in which people view things differently.

and that Google should change its hiring practices to improve this, instead of ethnical or national diversity.

And he makes up more pseudo-scientific arguments for why Google should hire more conservatives:

> conservatives tend to be higher in conscientiousness, which is require for much of the drudgery and maintenance work characteristic of a mature company.

In the context of his memo - where he states that Google is too far left-wing - the recommended changes are obvious: Hire more conservative. He also recommends to track the political affiliation of all existing employees to track the diversity gap there:

> I would start by breaking down Googlegeist scores by political orientation

This is the same kind of affirmative action that he criticizes just a few paragraphs before.

Is it affirmative action if they are hiring with the belief that they the hiring decision they are making will best improve the performance of the company?

If you have evidence that diversity has a positive impact on company performance and you have two candidates who other otherwise exact equals except one is a woman/conservative. Is it affirmative action to choose the under represented option?

I don't think it's affirmative action rather its just good business sense. I consider affirmative action to be the hiring of a group who is perceived to be discriminated against, simply because of that discrimination.

We could look at the legal definition of affirmative action that German courts considered illegal:

Affirmative Action, or illegal discrimination, is given when a company bases its hiring decisions in any way on anything but the employees merit. If age/gender/race/political beliefs/religious beliefs/etc have any influence on the hiring decision, it is illegal discrimination.

And he argues similarly, that affirmative action in any way is bad, and Google shouldn't do it - then he argues again that Google should do it, but only for the benefit of conservatives.

Let's compare what he writes to the German definition:

"treat people as individuals, not as just another member of their group"

Check.

"Stop restricting programs and classes to certain genders or races."

Check.

"[Our programs] can easily backfire since they incentivize illegal discrimination."

Check.

So he is 100% on-board with the German definition. Google's existing programs, OTOH, are not. They would be illegal in Germany if the definition you've given is correct.

The only thing I can find in his "Suggestions" for the "benefit" of conservatives is the following:

"Stop alienating conservatives"

"We should empower those with different ideologies to be able to express themselves."

Wow, stop alienating a group of people and allow them to speak. That's just horrific. Off with his head!

Where did he call for hiring more conservatives specifically for being conservative? I think I missed that part.

Actually for some reason I interpreted as "Stop alienating conservatives", but clearly there is no where in the article where he alludes to this, well except for a few dozen times.