Parallel processing is a built-in option available with many SAP programs that helps improve the throughput and processing time of business transactions that must process large amounts of data in a tight time frame. This article shows you how to determine whether parallel processing is the right course of action, how the workload is split up to achieve greater throughput, the options available to you to maximize performance, and how to use concurrent batch jobs when parallel processing is not an option automatically provided by the program. It also points out the two most common parallel-processing pitfalls and how to avoid them.