When you set out to design an application, you have several critical decisions to make - its functionality, user options, user interface, interfaces to other processes or systems, etc. Whether or not to build a parallel-processing option is one of these. This article helps you make this decision by providing criteria for evaluating whether parallel processing will benefit your program and whether your program can support this option. It also compares different parallel-processing distribution methods (fixed versus dynamic) and demonstrates why the first method that comes to mind (fixed) is often not the optimal choice. The authors discuss the design decisions involved and outline a comprehensive code framework for dynamic distribution of workloads to parallel processes.