I have experienced similar, not as extreme but the feeling of being overly mindful of "risks", creating lots of spikes rather than just doing what needs to be d

I have experienced similar, not as extreme but the feeling of being overly mindful of "risks", creating lots of spikes rather than just doing what needs to be done. Estimation in scrums are meant for exactly -- estimation, a way for developers to do a sanity check on if there are major disagreements on how complex an issue is and therefore its value when comparing to current business priorities. If you're breaking it down so small just so you feel you have "completed" sprints, you're gaming the system and lying to yourselves. Just understand that it is OK to not complete sprints, as long as you have a goal you can measure against and get a good feeling to how well you did. Why not try to be more transparent and open with your team? Exactly what you just wrote here and let them know and then maybe you can have a discussion and see what happens from there, maybe they could move to something else like Kanban, or maybe they can improve the current way they work. If still nobody is willing to change and your frustration continues, then consider if you should leave your job. Sometimes people in a team develop this group-think and it doesn't necessarily mean there's no hope, often it just takes someone to take the initiative and voice their frustrations.