My understanding is that current forager tribes still do not have a head man or a council. Things are decided as a group, because it's a very egalitarian society at the same time that it is very group oriented. Plus, with only 20-50 in the band, they could do this. This is almost certainly what our ancient ancestors did as well. The clan mother was the oldest woman, who had a place of respect, but she wasn't the equivalent of a chief or leader. That only comes later when you begin to get a little more hierarchy.

I used to work for a non-profit that was run on a partnership model. Yes, there were people who were "in charge" of certain things, but they really were just the team leaders who also participated in doing the work - they didn't just "manage" others. A primary role was to make sure that everyone on the team had what they needed to do their work. -power to and power with rather than power over. The underlying ethos was that we were really invested in each other's success because we all really cared about each other on a personal level. That meant that any disagreements or problems got resolved from that place, like you would in a healthy family. Then more corporate types got ahold of it and ruined that because all they understood was patriarchal style hierarchy and making people do things because you have more power and can do that. I quit then.