In the life of just about every billionaire, there comes a time to write a book. Their readers are to suppose that if they follow the wealthy person’s principles, which are invariably laid out chapter by chapter, bullet point by bullet point, then they, too, will possess the keys to riches and power.

It’s always a tantalizing proposition, which is why these types of business books sell so well. The book actually becomes a must-read when the advice comes from someone like Charles Koch, the longtime chairman and chief executive of Koch Industries, the world’s largest privately held company.

Mr. Koch unveiled his story, “The Science of Success: How Market-Based Management Built the World’s Largest Private Company,” at a lunch yesterday with the leading members of the city’s financial press. He left no doubt that his training as an engineer (by way of three such degrees from MIT) drives the way he thinks about how his company works and its place in society.

“What I love about engineering is that there’s a right way and a wrong way to do something,” Mr. Koch said to an audience that included his daughter, Elizabeth, the editor of a literary magazine. “People who share their ideas are always saying that you should listen to their way of doing something. That kind of thinking doesn’t help you when building a bridge.”

It took more than just chemical engineering know-how for the man to methodically build Koch Industries into a vast entity over four decades. His Market-Based Management system is a list of 10 guiding principles borne of ideas and feeling. Make no mistake about it, though: Don’t mess with Charles Koch or his company, even if you’re related to him.

In building a successful petrochemical and paper goods conglomerate (maker of Lycra spandex, Stainmaster carpet, and Dixie cups), it helps to start off by inheriting the company from your father, which is just what Mr. Koch did. He and a brother spent 20 years battling two other brothers in court over hundreds of million of dollars of corporate proceeds in an extended drama worthy of a primetime soap opera. (One of the brothers who sued him repeatedly is Bill Koch, the winner of the America’s Cup in the early 1990s.)

The inter-family lawsuits have been settled, but Koch Industries, in the wake of its acquisition of paper goods company Georgia-Pacific, has some 59,000 outstanding lawsuits. Mr. Koch admits the legal machinations are considerable.

He is more focused, however, on the importance of the company and every one of its employees adding value to the world around them. The second principle of MBM is compliance. Mr. Koch says that 100% of his employees must strive for full compliance 100% of the time. The way he sees it, that’s 10,000% compliance.

The other principles involve integrity, principled entrepreneurship, customer focus, knowledge, change, humility, respect, and fulfillment. Mr. Koch’s corporate guidelines would make everyone from an operations management expert to Oprah Winfrey proud.

The reason Mr. Koch can take his book tour on the road and sound like a thoughtful manager is because of other battles he’s had to wage as he’s grown the company. “Just as we were articulating and codifying the system that was contributing to our success, we were caught unprepared by the rapid increase in regulation, politicization, and litigation,” Mr. Koch writes. “These changes have universally damaged the ability of businesses to create real value and contribute to societal well-being.”

The root of the problem, according to Mr. Koch is that while business “was becoming increasingly regulated, we kept thinking and acting as if we lived in a pure market economy. The reality was far different. The laws of economics seemed less and less relevant in a world where the uncertainty of politics had replaced the uncertainty of the marketplace.”

The most enduring of all the MBM principles is ‘value creation.’ Mr. Koch says it’s creating value over the long term. And it’s definitely economic value. Beyond that, value creation is all about how an employee puts the guiding principles of MBM to work in all of his endeavors.

Mr. Koch desires neither a highly productive scoundrel nor an honest loafer. In a way, the people that do best at Koch Industries resemble the conglomerate for which they work: complex and multi-faceted, yet focused and determined.