How to normalize a mantissa

I'm trying to convert an int into a custom float, in which the user specifies the amount of bits reserved for the exp and mantissa, but I don't understand how the conversion works. My function takes in an int value and and int exp to represent the number (value * 2^exp) i.e value = 12, exp = 4, returns 192. but I don't understand the process I need to do to change these. I've been looking at this for days and playing with IEEE converter web apps but I just don't understand what the normalization process is. Like I see that its "move the binary point and adjust the exponent" but I have no idea what this means, can anyone give me an example to go off of? I've been searching Google for an example I can understand but this just isn't making any sense to me