What if the employee knows the action, or results, violate the law? What if the employee is part of an important community or organization in the field that has ethical standards that would be violated and result in the employee's ejection from that community?

There are many reasons why in many engineering fields there's a licensing process and exam, but one of the most important ones, from the employee's perspective, is being able to say "No, I can't do that, I would lose my license".