The Rt Hon Lady Justice Gloster has called for litigators and arbitration lawyers to pay greater attention to cost efficiency to meet increasing demand from clients.

Dame Elizabeth Gloster, who was the keynote speaker at the Legal Week Commercial Litigation and Arbitration Forum today (6 November), said that lawyers need to reflect on whether the services they offer match the requirements of international clients in the modern world.

She said: "It seems to me that all of us who practice – whether as litigators, arbitration practitioners, arbitrators or judges in the international commercial world, in whatever jurisdiction – need to take a long, hard look at how we go about doing our business and how we provide our services to our clients.

"We need to ask ourselves what challenges we face to meet the ever increasing demands of our clients, international business communities, for the delivery of efficient and cost effective dispute resolution procedures."

Gloster, who has been a Lady Justice of Appeal since 2013, also warned against complacency when it comes to competition from "increasingly innovative" dispute resolution hubs in less traditional jurisdictions, such as the Dubai International Financial Centre, which are "setting up to challenge" the traditional commercial courts and dispute resolution centres in London, New York and Paris.

"It is not enough […] for either English or US lawyers to sit back in a self-satisfied glow and say that English, or US, litigation and arbitration procedures have traditionally provided the best solution," said Gloster. "We have to stress test those assumptions, tools and procedures in an increasingly competitive, globalised legal world where business and demand have changed exponentially in the last few years."

In her keynote address, Gloster also urged lawyers to question whether in some cases it would be better to avoid litigation, and instead to negotiate an informal compromise or even capitulate entirely rather than "wasting time, money and effort".

Gloster said: "We lawyers […] need to understand the requirements of the commercial client for effective dispute resolution. We need to be far more sensitive of what they actually want from us."

She noted that sometimes she would find herself looking at a courtroom "full of lawyers, at fantastic rates an hour, fumbling over stacks of lever arch files stuffed full of documents which are hardly ever [reverted to], and mountains of paper and legal authorities which are very often totally irrelevant."

Gloster added: "I wonder whether lawyers are listening to their clients at alll."

In particular, she encouraged lawyers to consider four questions from a theoretical clients' perspective: why lawyers are "still working in a paper environment" when the rest of the business world is "happily operating in an electronic one"; why lawyers are "charging so much" for disclosure that existing electronic programs can complete more cheaply and efficiently; why lawyers spend time crafting lengthy witness statements when the issues are "often very clear and not susceptible to factual evidence"; and why is it all "costing so much despite new technology".

She added that litigators should expect "more interventionist consideration" from judges, who are becoming more "proactive in relation to costs in the aftermath of the Jackson report".

The event also included speakers such as Clifford Chance litigation partner Simon Davis, Herbert Smith Freehills global head of disputes Justin D'Agostino and BAE Systems senior counsel Mike Stocks.